Manson: The Life and Times of Charles Manson

The New York Times bestselling, authoritative account of the life
of Charles Manson, filled with surprising new information and
previously unpublished photographs: “A riveting, almost Dickensian
narrative…four stars” (People).

More than forty years ago
Charles Manson and his mostly female commune killed nine people, among
them the pregnant actress Sharon Tate. It was the culmination of a
criminal career that author Jeff Guinn traces back to Manson’s
childhood. Guinn interviewed Manson’s sister and cousin, neither of whom
had ever previously cooperated with an author. Childhood friends,
cellmates, and even some members of the Manson family have provided new
information about Manson’s life. Guinn has made discoveries about the
night of the Tate murders, answering unresolved questions, such as why
one person near the scene of the crime was spared.

Manson
puts the killer in the context of the turbulent late sixties, an era of
race riots and street protests when authority in all its forms was
under siege. Guinn shows us how Manson created and refined his message
to fit the times, persuading confused young women (and a few men) that
he had the solutions to their problems. At the same time he used them to
pursue his long-standing musical ambitions. His frustrated ambitions,
combined with his bizarre race-war obsession, would have lethal
consequences.

Guinn’s book is a “tour de force of a biography…Manson
stands as a definitive work: important for students of criminology,
human behavior, popular culture, music, psychopathology, and
sociopathology…and compulsively readable” (Ann Rule, The New York Times Book Review).